Slipping Through My Fingers
by In The Loft
Summary: Fagin reminisces about Nancy after her death.


**A/N: So this was an idea I had whilst listening to this AMAZING song. I don't know why I like writing stuff about Fagin and Nancy. Basically – this is a songfic for Slipping Through My Fingers. It's Fagin reminiscing about Nancy, the day she dies. This is MUSICAL based. I know it is very soft for Fagin... Well, please read and tell me what you think. **

_Schoolbag in hand, she leaves home in the early morning,_

_Waving goodbye with an absent minded smile,_

Nancy always had been absent. Her head in the clouds. When she was little it seemed as if she followed the rest of the gang out of habit – trailing after Bill with a smile on her lips and her eyes bright.

_I watch her go, with a surge of that well known sadness,_

_And I have to sit down for a while,_

And now she was gone. Murdered. By Bill. Fagin had seen Bill's darker side – he had caught a glimpse of it the day he met him, but he would never – _never – _have painted him as a murderer. Fagin was not new to sorrow – he would have had to lead a charmed life if he was, but Nancy was different. He had collapsed into a chair when the news came. His legs still felt weak. Maybe it was just the age.

_The feeling that I'm losing her forever,_

_And without really entering her world._

Fagin could no longer see the laughing red head. He closed his eyes – and there was no picture. There were so many things he had not asked her. How had she felt about Bill really. All those times Nancy had turned up on the doorstep. Fagin had let her in without a word. He could have helped her. And now she was gone. And she was never coming back.

_I'm glad whenever I can share her laughter,_

_That funny little girl._

Her laugh. Fagin had liked that laugh. He liked it when any of his gang laughed really, but Nancy... She had a happy laugh. And considering all she had been through... She had been such a cheery little girl though. Always the early riser – sitting at the table, humming, whistling through her teeth when Fagin shuffled in to make breakfast. She would chirp at him, and he would growl back – afraid of how much he cared for her. How much that funny little girl meant to him.

_Slipping through my fingers all the time,_

_I try to capture every minute,_

_The feeling in it,_

_Slipping through my fingers all the time._

_Do I even see what's in her mind?_

_Each time I'm close to knowing,_

_She keeps on growing, _

_Slipping through my fingers all the time. _

She was like one of the ribbons she wore in her hair. The minute Fagin began to understand her – she grew, changed, slipped past him. He felt like he was chasing a wind, or a feather – floating high above his head. She had been his daughter, and he hoped he had been her father. And yet, she grew, and she changed. And she went.

_Sleep in our eyes,_

_Her and me at the breakfast table,_

So many times they had been the only ones in the loft. When she grew older – and ran to him for safety when Bill hit her... He had given her her old bed, and she would wake up late. The gang would have left. She would sit opposite him at the table – bruises livid on her face, and pretend not to notice him.

_Barely awake, _

_I let precious time go by_

And he would just nod off over his sausages. Age changed him like it had changed her. There was no talking between them – precious time Fagin had wasted. He wanted to help _so _badly now he couldn't.

_Then, when she's gone, there's that odd melancholy feeling,_

_And a sense of guilt I can't deny _

She would whisk off after breakfast – go back to 'her Bill.' And he would be alone, feeling slightly sad, and definitely guilty. It had been like that when she was younger too. As soon as the door slammed shut behind Nancy and her childhood friends Fagin would be at the window, watching them cross the bridges and out of sight. It wasn't just Nancy... But in the end it always was.

_What happened to those wonderful adventures?_

_The places I had planned for us to go?_

When she was small... Five – she had come to the gang – he would sit her on his lap and tell her about all the different worlds outside London, promise her he would take her to them. She would blink up at him out of big blue eyes, absorbing his every word. Sitting here, now, with her death hanging like a shadow over him, Fagin wondered what happened to that promise.

_Well some of that we did,_

_But most we didn't..._

_And why – I just don't know._

He had taken her away once – to the countryside for a day. It had been an accident – she had fallen asleep on the back of the cart, and he hadn't the heart to wake her. Why they were on the cart in the first place Fagin couldn't remember.

_Sometimes I wish I could freeze the picture,_

There were so many moments in his life that he wanted to go back to again, and again, and again. If he could just stay in them forever. When Nancy was a little girl – that day in the countryside, early mornings, and then, later in life, watching her sing her ditty with Dodger, joining in.

_And save it from the funny tricks of time_

Because sometimes, when Fagin looked back he couldn't see it properly, or there were little bits that didn't make sense. He shut his eyes now – and Nancy's laughing face was gone.

_Slipping through my fingers..._

He missed her like a tooth ache, a heart ache – persisting. He didn't have anything left in him to cry anymore – but his gang did that for him. Sobbing in the night. And Fagin didn't do anything. It was Nancy all over again.

_Slipping through my fingers all the time._

She was gone.

His little girl.

Nancy.

**Pleeease review. I'd really appreciate it. **


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